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Monday, 15 October 2012

IOP Publishing announces the launch of its ebook programme and a new partnership

IOP Publishing (IOP) has today announced its
entrance into the book market as part of a long-term strategy to expand its
support to the research community by offering the broadest range of publishing
services to authors and readers.

The IOP ebook programme will provide an
additional content channel for authors looking to publish with a society
publisher. The programme has been designed to meet the demands of today’s
research community by delivering authoritative, high-quality books in physics.

The new portfolio will cover topics across the
physical sciences and will support the needs of physicists as well as
researchers from other disciplines who are working in interdisciplinary areas
of research.

IOP has had a long history in books publishing
and was one of the first publishers to experiment with ebooks. The company sold
the books division in 2005 to focus on its journals portfolio; however, since
then the landscape and demand for ebooks has changed dramatically. IOP is now
excellently positioned to serve the needs of the community.This innovative e-first book programme is built
with the future in mind. As born-digital content, free of legacy issues, it is
designed to meet the needs of the research community in a changing publishing
environment.

IOP is also delighted to announce a strategic
partnership with Morgan and Claypool Publishers (M&C) to build a dedicated
collection as part of the overall ebook program. M&C have combined an
innovative editorial approach with an e-first model which has made them one of
the leading innovators in high-quality book publishing.

M&C’s publishing model – which already
serves the engineering and computer science communities with its Synthesis
Digital Library, and the life sciences community with its Colloquium Digital
Library – will be adopted to create a new physics collection.

M&C’s unique publishing model emphasizes the
rapid digital publication of short books on key research topics that can be
incrementally revised and expanded over time. The model makes it possible
to publish tutorial works on active research areas much earlier than with
traditional print book models. Its books provide access to advanced
research that is much more accessible than the original research literature and
provides extensive linked bibliographies for readers who wish to go further.

Olaf Ernst, Commercial Director of IOP
Publishing said: “It is a natural fit for IOP, through its close relationship
with the physics community, to launch a high-quality ebook programme that will
complement its existing journals portfolio. We have a shared vision with
M&C to serve the research community by delivering high-quality content
through an innovative publishing approach. This will form the basis of a strong
partnership and I very much look forward to working together on this.”

Michael Morgan, President and CEO of Morgan and
Claypool, said: “We are very enthusiastic to collaborate with IOP and to
benefit from its deep knowledge and commitment to the physics discipline in
jointly developing a resource that we both believe will be of significant
value.”

Commissioning content will begin immediately.

ENDS

Notes to Editors

For further information, contact Karen Watts,
Public Relations Manager at IOP Publishing on +44 (0)117 930 1110 or e-mail karen.watts@iop.org.